Eating Right can be SIMPLE

If you name the diet, or the diet pill, I was bound to have tried it or taking it at sometime or another in my 20s. I never quite understood what food was supposed to be used for-all I knew was that if it was making me “fat” then I had to get rid of what was causing the problem in my eyes. I just kept doing the same cycle over and over again of deprivation and frustration until I had gotten to a point where I was heavier than when I first started and knew there had to be a change.

When I originally did insanity back in 2010,  I was eating right and learning how to embrace natural foods and whole food nutrition. However, when I started to increase my physical activity and become stronger + started to teach classes in addition to my own workouts I hit another plateau that I didn’t expect on this new phase of my journey. I remember starting the 21 day fix when it released in June 2014 and thinking that nothing was going to change-I was gonna see no results because I was already doing what I was “supposed to do.” Right?! I mean, I was eating protein after every workout, I was eating vegetables and fruits, I was avoiding all starches and greens altogether because they were supposed to be bad for me-that was the right thing to do at the time – so I thought.

The main thing that I learned on my first round of the program was that I was not doing as well as I thought I was. Shocker! Number one thing that I learned by using this process of taking food containers and understanding portion sizes and categorizing food by macro nutrients that I was getting the proper amounts was that I wasn’t eating enough-of the right things.

My point in sharing my story with the 21 day fix is that I feel that many times we make food extremely complicated.  We think that we need to take things away, and that we need to increase certain other things, and that we should be popping a bunch of pills for additional vitamins when all actuality we just need to be sure to fuel our muscles and taking vegetables and fruits that can give additional nutrition where we fall short.

I do believe that everybody stomach and everybody’s dietary needs are different, so I’m not recommending anything that doesn’t work for someone who has a restriction of course.

I think that the calorie counting, the labels, the titles such as vegetarian or “pescatarian” and or “vegan” can really stressed out the general population into thinking that they’re not doing something right.  If someone has been to a doctor, or has seen that taking out meat or dairy or wheat is better for their stomach and their overall health and that is what they should do. However, the fads such as “light” or “fat free” or “gluten free” or “low carb” aren’t necessarily impactful for most. Sometimes, we see a shiny new label on food products and we think that we also need to file that food trend. Been there myself many times and I’ve tried just about every marketing focus in the food industry over the past few decades.

We simply need to take time to journal what were eating-get a feel for what feels good and what does it in our system. We should also remember to focus on eating food that came from the earth versus food that was processed in a plant being made from a natural ingredients.

We have to remember and understand basic nutrition: carbohydrates are for energy and not necessarily bad for your body, proteins are meant to heal muscles, and fats are used for every day organ function and energy as well. (In excess, large amounts of starchy carbohydrates can impact our overall fitness journey if we don’t use the energy up with exercise.)

SIMPLIFYING FOOD + LEARNING HOW IT WORKS IN OUR BODIES can make life easier for us and help us fuel our bodies better!

I share my experience and perspective on how the 21 Day Fix changed my way of eating and how I SIMPLIFY making food at home HERE: